.
Is it just me, or is everyone else hitting perfect skin, right out of the can?
No !
Either..
Digital cameras act as a kind of Xray machine and show up veins under the skin leading to exagerated changes of tone not visible to the eye or pleaseant in print/onscreen
or
Digital cameras are insensitive to red - so blotches wine noses etc really show up badly because they are red and show up darker
so
1) shoot spaniards and argentinians - not english roses !
2) make shure the subject is physically warm not cold
----
I have tried IR cut filter to cut infrared - helps 5%
If you are using (strobe) lights you could consider this..
a (very) mild red filter over the light will mean the light is red and shadow under eyes for example are red so they become effectively lighter in the image proportionaly reflectiing more light
of course you grey card it to get rid of the actual cast
Shooting tungsten has a red cast that will have the same effect after correction so maybe shoot under tungsten
(I got taught at black and white school to shoot women under tunsgsten and men under blue to roughen them up !)
of course when trying to balance against other lights like daylight this becomes problematic
This is the same trickery that causes confusing colours under sodium street lighting where bits of the spectrum are not reflecting strongly*
The game is to fool the sensor
Just my thoughts
S
*interestingly the yorkshire ripper a uk murderer is believed to have evaded capture partly because a witness 'mis identified' the colour of his car under sodium lighting leading the police off the trail because the murderer was ruled out on the colour of his car - it was later realised that his car would have been the colour the witness described when viewed under street lighiting at night